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PNS Daily Newscast - January 21, 2019

Could the nation’s airports be the next pressure points in the government shutdown? Also on our Monday rundown: Calls go out to improve food safety; and a new report renews calls for solutions to Detroit’s water woes.

OR Union Members: Fewer, but Reaching Further

PHOTO: Oregon's union movement has broadened its aims to include more social justice issues and encompass nonunion workers as well. Courtesy Oregon AFL-CIO.

January 28, 2013

SALEM, Ore. - New national figures say union membership is on the decline across the country. It's part of a national trend that labor leaders say is the result of unemployment overall and anti-union activity in states like Wisconsin and Indiana.

However, Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) figures also point to some changes in union membership that could be beneficial in the long run, according to Oregon AFL-CIO president Tom Chamberlain. Unions are reaching beyond their ranks and into the community, he says, joining with students, activists and minority groups to work on social justice issues.

"When we broaden our base, we become more powerful," he explains. "It's not power that's given to our national leaders, it's community power that allows us to move a grassroots agenda - a workers' agenda, at the local level."

The Oregon AFL-CIO, the state's largest labor organization, also has a young leaders' group, an LGBT group, and black and Latino organizations. The survey says despite the overall drop in union numbers, more Asian, black and Latino workers are joining unions. And it reports that Oregon remains in the 'top 10' states for union membership, with 250,000 workers represented.

Every week, Chamberlain says, his office gets calls from people interested in forming a union in their workplace. He insists there is still some intimidation from employers, although that is illegal. Eroding benefits are workers' most common concern, he says.

"We're seeing more and more employers telling their workers, 'You can't work more than 30 hours, because if you do, we've got to pay for your health care.' We've got to fix that. Employers have got to step up to the plate. They have to be responsible."

In the legislature, the Oregon AFL-CIO is backing a bill to require that public employers stay neutral in any union organizing effort. It is also proposing that lawmakers be able to commit to numbers of living-wage jobs for every piece of legislation they tout as a "job-creator."